AfricaCom Report 2019
AfricaCom report:
Held in Cape Town, South Africa, AfricaCom brings together 15,000+ attendees, 450+ speakers and 500 exhibitors (on average in recent years), from the telecoms and technology industries. It is the biggest event in Africa for these markets, with the focus this year on connectivity infrastructure, disruptive technologies, digital services and ICT strategy.
This year a new zone was introduced, ‘AfricaTech’, which brought together innovators and architects at the forefront of Africa’s journey towards the Fourth Industrial Revolution. This was designed to enhance knowledge of Africa’s enterprise transformation and digital future.
Hot topics:
As with many telecom conferences currently, the main buzz around AfricaCom this year was 5G. AfricaCom’s annual Insights Survey asked Telco’s in attendance this year, what technologies they should and will be investing their money in over the coming years. With 29%, 5G investment came out on top.
Another noticeable topic was discussions that reflected the socio-economic status across Africa. Africa is rapidly narrowing the gap in technological and digital divides. This can be explained by the addition of 960 million mobile subscriptions in 2017. This need for instant connectivity and accessibility is a reflection of the digitalised growth that Africa is experiencing.
Deveo’s ‘AfricaCom report’:
We have been attending AfricaCom for the past 6 years, and after speaking with many exhibitors, the general feedback we received was that, although the number of visitors was the same, if not more than previous years, the number of visitors from the Telco’s industry was in decline. They felt the increase perhaps came from the introduction of the AfricaTech hall. Thus meaning more visitors in the Technology, Digital, IT and IoT industries.
We also noticed a larger number of empty booths this year as well as an increase in Asian exhibitors, especially Chinese. Whether this reflects the ongoing trade discussions between China and the US, we do not know, but it does seem to be that China have decided to expand into Africa.
What Deveo achieved:
Deveo ran a number of successful campaigns for our clients at AfricaCom this year to ensure they were meeting new leads from our database of known AfricaCom attendees. At shows like this, you cannot expect people to simply drop by your booth. However we can help to make sure the right decision makers know where to find you and when.
Deveo will now be looking ahead to one of the busiest times of the year for us – MWC Barcelona. However before that we will enjoy celebrating Christmas with family and friends, and we wish the same for you!
If you would like to start planning your MWC strategy, please do not hesitate to contact the Deveo team. We would be happy to discuss this in further detail with you.
